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The Hon. Rufus Heath, in requesting his son's attendance in the library that morning, had reckoned without the "Horse-show." For that day was the concluding one of the County Agricultural Fair, which, though held ostensibly in honor of sundry overgrown vegetables and patchwork quilts, derived its principal attraction from the "Grand Exhibition of Blood and other Horses," which terminated it. The exhibition consisted in a number of fast nags showing their points, and competing for prizes on a race-course conveniently near the fair-grounds. To attend these "trials of speed" was far more to John Peter Heath's taste, than to be immured in his father's library copying tedious documents. Hence he did not deliberate long over the paternal mandate, and was soon spinning away comfortably behind his trotting mare to the fair. He stayed there the greater part of the day; swaggering over the grounds with a knowing air; noisily backing horses by bets with stable-men and blacklegs, and losing some of his wife's money which rather soured him, for Jack had a decided streak of stinginess in his character, and disliked extremely to part with money that had not ministered to his selfish gratifications. So, to console himself for his ill-luck, he repaired to a public-house hard by, and cracked bottles of wine with boon companions until the remembrance of his losses supervened, and he became obstreperous; swore he had been cheated; grew abusive; drew off his coat to fight anybody, and but for the interposition of the landlord, might have received a severe pommelling. In this condition he mounted his vehicle to return home. The spirited little mare, having been kept so long waiting at the tavern door, had become restive, and it was with some difficulty that she could be held by the hostler while Jack got into the wagon. He gathered the reins, flung a dime to the man, and the mare released, sped off like an arrow.

The sun was setting as Jack crossed the bridge over the Passaic at the north end of town, and the toll-gatherer noticed that the driver was (as he had often seen him before) in liquor. Jack Heath was not at any time a very pleasing object to look at, and still less so when in his cups, for his tipsiness bore an expression of defiant arrogance that boded no good to intermeddlers. Thus, flown with insolence and wine, along he went, lashing his horse and driving recklessly up the principal street of the town, in utter disregard of the wayfarers, whom he roughly ordered with an oath to get out of his way. Just at that moment a young man, with a slight limp in his gait, was crossing the street, who seemed in no haste to accelerate his pace at Jack Heath's bidding. A well-dressed young fellow he was, of about twenty, with a dash of pretension in his appearance, and a light in his eye that betokened a spirit not likely to brook dictation. Jack, unfortunately, was not in a condition to discriminate, and as he approached the pedestrian, yelled, with a curse, "Ki-hi—cripple! Out of the way, or I'll run over you!" No sooner were these words uttered, than the young man, pale with anger, raised a light cane he carried, and struck fiercely at the horse's head. The nervous animal, frightened at this sudden attack, sprang off sideways, dashing the light jagger against the curb, and sending its occupant headlong to the earth. Such an excitement in the quiet street! The disaster occurred directly opposite McGoffin's "Shoe Emporium," and that honest tradesman ran out, leaving Miss Winter (a highly respectable maiden lady whom he was about measuring for bootees) to expose in her agitation and stockings her somewhat large and bulbous feet to the brutal gaze of a gathering crowd. The colored barber from over the way hastened to the spot with a razor in his hand, followed by a half-shaved client with lathered, face and bib on, and then in quick succession loungers from the "Tanglefoot Saloon" and corner grocery. Meanwhile, the cause of all this trouble, whom we may as well introduce to the reader at once as Mark Gildersleeve, forgot his resentment on seeing the plight of his insulter, and hurried off for a physician, under the impression that; perhaps, Jack Heath was killed. There he lay in the kennel, stunned, with a cut on his sconce and a contemplative crowd about him. Discussions arose as to whether he was dead or dying, and a glass of brandy was put to his lips as a test; it probably being deemed conclusive that if he did not drink, or at least taste the beverage, he must be very nearly in the former condition. As he did neither, his case looked hopeless, and some one suggested removing him to the apothecary's shop; but Mr. Snopple, the photographer, a little fat man who diffused an aroma of collodion about him, protested strenuously, reminding the by-standers that it would be a violation of the law, and render a person liable to prosecution to disturb the body until the coroner came and an inquest was held. Advice not altogether disinterested on the part of Mr. Snopple, who, in his professional zeal, saw at once an excellent opportunity for an effective picture, and did not wish the group disturbed while he hastened off to his studio for a camera. Unfortunately for the advancement of art, before he returned, George Gildersleeve, the ubiquitous, appeared on the scene. Here was a man of action. He took one hand out of its pocket, felt of Jack and pronounced him "right enough," and then addressing the crowd said, "Lay hold here, boys, some of you, and toss him into this cart and get him home. He's hefty."

And "hefty" he was, sure enough, and it took some tugging from strong arms to lift the dead weight of his bulky form into a grocer's cart near at hand, for the racing jagger was badly broken, and the mare had scampered off with the thills.

By this time Mark Gildersleeve had returned with Dr. Wattletop, and the latter accompanied Jack to his home, where the fears of his relatives were speedily allayed by his being pronounced not seriously injured, but uncommonly drunk.

When Dr. Wattletop returned to his domicil he found Mark Gildersleeve awaiting him. "How is he, doctor?" eagerly asked the young man.

"Oh bless you, he'll do. The devil takes care of his own. Born to be hung, you know, and so forth. A simple contusion—plastered it up—he'll be all right when he gets sober. He's just ugly enough, too, to appear worse than he is, and frightened his sweet little sister out of her wits. The others, though, didn't seem to mind it so much, and no wonder. But what makes you so anxious about him? When you came after me, you looked so pale and agitated hopes arose of a profitable patient. They're not so plenty now as they might be, and I welcome them with joy and gratitude," said the doctor, tapping Mark familiarly on the shoulder.

"I feel so relieved, doctor; I was afraid he might be seriously hurt. He provoked me, and I retaliated. Had I noticed or known that he was drunk, perhaps I would not have minded him. He fell so heavily that I feared he might have broken his neck."

"He might, I grant, but he didn't. More's the pity, perhaps, for his friends and family. Especially for that poor wife of his, whom he will certainly kill in time, if he don't kill himself first. But, so you were the one that caused all this row, eh? You didn't say anything about that before. How dared you, rash youth, raise your ire against the heir-apparent? Fear you not the wrath of the prince-regnant? Know ye not that for thrift to follow it is as necessary now, as ever, to fawn to wealth and position? Anchylosis, my boy, invariably affects the pocket, mind that!"

"If it were not for—" began Mark, with a determined look, which he suddenly checked, to add with a quiet smile, "No one knows better than you, doctor, what little store I set by thrift, or any considerations of that kind. I trust my ambition aims higher than that."

"Fresh and admirable adolescence! Roseate age, when the glistening soap-bubble, Fame, hath more charms than substantial shekels! So be it, and well it is so, for without those soft illusions the aridity of existence would be insupportable, the world a desert and life a blank. And now, my boy, while I wash my hands bring out the chess-board. I'll give you a bishop to-night, and unless I am interrupted by some silly biped seeking admittance to this sphere of trouble, or some still sillier one reluctant to leave it, we'll have a snug hour or two of enjoyment. So, votary of Caïssa, to chess—to chess."

Soon the polished dome of the doctor's capacious head, and the curly black pate of the young man, were bent in intense study over the checkered field of mimic battle. In silence passed the moments until a scratching at the door announced a visitor. "Ah, Dagon! Open the door, Mark, and let him in, please," said the doctor.

The young man complied, and a large black Newfoundland dog walked gravely in towards the doctor, and rested his head on his master's knee to be caressed. "True friend—faithful heart! Mark, three winters ago that dog saved my life. I was called out the night of the great snowstorm to go to the Furnaces, and but for Dagon your most obedient wouldn't be here. I've told it you before, I believe, so I'll not repeat the circumstances, but I love to dwell on them. Last spring he drew a child out of the canal; he would allow himself to be cut to pieces for me, and yet they say he has no soul! The Turks say the same of women. Are we any wiser? They say, too, he has no reason. Look at his expressive, sagacious eye. The gibbering idiot has a soul, the vilest miscreant reason; but this noble animal has neither, 'tis said, and man's vanity invents instinct! O man—man, what a conceited fool thou art! Check, eh? Ha! a bold move, my boy."

The doctor's speculations were cut short by a brilliant stroke on the part of his adversary, and as the game is becoming more absorbing, and the players less communicative, we will leave them, to digress a little.

Dr. Basil Wattletop had been an English army-surgeon, and as such had spent much of his time in foreign parts. How he came to drift into Belton, no one knew positively, although there was a legend that he had stopped there one day, on his way from Canada, to view the cataract, and had remained in the town ever since. Be this as it might, there he was and had been for many years, enjoying a lucrative practice, as he doubtless well deserved, for he was a skilful practitioner. An odd-looking man he was, a bachelor of very uncertain age, yet hale and vigorous; in person short and rotund, like the typical Briton of mature years, with thin wisps of brown hair brushed around his bald crown, and large searching dark eyes set in a long, grave, rubicund face. In attire inclined to carelessness, but scrupulous as to polished shoes and immaculate linen, wearing collars perilously starched over a throttling black stock, the buckle and tag of which prominently ornamented his nape. Partial indeed was he to this stock, despite the sway of fashion. In moments of caprice he would replace it by swaddling his short neck in a black cravat of many folds, the knot of which invariably slipped around and under his ear, giving him a losel and dissipated air.

His benevolent disposition had made him popular with the people of Belton, and many a poor body had reason to thank the good physician not only for gratuitous attendance, but for the wherewithal to buy indispensable remedies and comforts. We say had reason to thank him, for they seldom ventured to do so, certainly not a second time, for the doctor was exceedingly impatient of any manifestations of gratitude, and generally received them with a cynical or tart comment.

One weakness the doctor had in common with many of his countrymen—devotion to the social glass and flowing bowl, and when he had indulged over freely he was a changed man. Then his ordinary blandness forsook him, and he became pompous and choleric. He buttoned his coat tightly over his chest, carried his cane under his arm, and gave a defiant cock to his hat. Beware then how you contradicted him; beware how you defended that absurd heresy, homoeopathy; and above all, beware how you disparaged, even in the remotest degree, her Majesty of England, God bless her! as he would add, reverently lifting his hat. His loyalty and pomposity increased in proportion to the depths of his potations, but, whether in rigid obedience to a self-imposed law, or owing to the resistant power of his brain, he never appeared to exceed a certain well-defined limit; and no one had ever seen the doctor overcome, or known him to be in a worse state than that peculiar one indicated by a highly burnished nose, tetchy dignity, and exaggerated self-importance. The doctor was generally in this condition three evenings in the week, beginning at about four o'clock post-meridian, and so far from its being considered prejudicial to the exercise of his professional duties by his patients, many of them religiously believed that his sagacity was keener and skill greater at those times than at others.

The doctor was an enigma to the Belton folk. While they all respected him for his good qualities, many were offended at his sarcasm, puzzled by his paradoxes, or displeased at his oracular utterances. A few even pronounced him an "infidel" and an "atheist." Opinionated George Gildersleeve objected to the doctor's opinionativeness, and rated him a "pig-headed John Bull." As to the charge of atheism, who could have believed it that had ever seen the doctor at service, as he stood reverentially burying his red face in his stiff hat on Sundays in the fifth pew from the chancel, in the middle aisle of St. Jude's?

"Atheist, bosh!" said the doctor; "the old Latin proverb, Ubi tres medici duo athei, is simply nonsensical. Who comes so closely in contact with the mysterious ways of God, and realizes so thoroughly his own ignorance and impotence, as the physician? No—no, a corner of the veil has been uplifted to us, and we stand appalled and humble."

Mark Gildersleeve was almost an adopted son of the old physician, who had taken the youth in affection and proved an invaluable friend to him, chiefly by directing a course of reading and study. A priceless benefit this to Mark, whose advantages for instruction had been slight, for he had lost his parents at an early age, and been left to the care of his half-brother George, or rather to his half-brother's wife. It would have been difficult to find more dissimilar beings than these two brothers. George was the true son of Eben Gildersleeve, the tough old smith who could forge the best horse-shoe in the county; while Mark inherited the character and tastes of his mother, Eben Gildersleeve's second wife, a woman of beauty and delicacy, a rustic Venus mated to a village Vulcan. George was boisterous, given to bully and boast, and hid his purse-pride in an affected contempt for the world's opinion. Mark, on the contrary, was reserved, and rendered morbidly sensitive by a slight lameness resulting from an injury received in childhood—a mere blemish, though, in an otherwise well-knit and graceful form. For all his reserve the lad had a resolute and ambitious spirit. Gifted with quick perception, and a natural aptitude for mathematics, he had become, although almost self-taught, proficient as a mechanical engineer. After a common-school education, his brother, in accordance with the theory that the only road to success was through a diligent use of the flexors and extensors, set him to work in the shops, but it was not long before he was found to be more useful in the draughting room. Young as he was, Mark had introduced some valuable improvements in his brother's works, although that independent fellow was not over-ready to acknowledge it. On the contrary, he rather berated the young man behind his back, for a fop who cared for nothing but dress, or a fool who was occupied with dreams and poetry instead of devoting himself to his business. Mark, it must be admitted, sinned a little in that way, although not to an extent to justify his brother's railings. Full of enthusiasm and high aspirations, he scorned mere money-making, and as he earned enough to satisfy his wants he bestowed no further thought in that direction. This was a source of displeasure to George. "Confound the fellow," he would exclaim in the barber-shop, perhaps, or at Bird's livery stable, "Confound the fellow! he's no slouch, but as smart as they make 'em, and if he'd only stick to his work he'd be a rich man in time. I never had much of a head for figures, but it comes nat'ral to him. If he's a mind to, he can do more work than any other two men you can scare up, and if he aint a-mind, you can't coax or drive him. He'll go off and jingle away by the hour on a piano, like a girl, or play chess or read novels half the night. Why, he's even got a banjo up in his room that he strums away on like a nigger minstrel" (alluding to a Spanish guitar that Mark had bought, probably with the romantic intention of practising seguidillas). "Look at me," George would add as a clincher; "the only music ever I made was with a riveting hammer on a boiler, or a sledge on an anvil, and am I any the worse for it? Not much, I think, and here I am, as independent as a hog on ice! Don't owe a man a dollar in the world, and though I don't roost in as big a house as Rufe Heath or Pop Mumbie up on the hill yonder, they'll take my note at the bank as quick as either of theirs if I should ask it, which I don't, as I pays as I goes; and what's more, I can dust any of 'em on the plank-road any day of the week, with as pretty a pair o' flyers as there is in the State, and if you don't believe it here's the soap to back it for any amount from fifty to five thousand!"

And he would conclude customarily by drawing out a well-stuffed wallet, and slapping it energetically, with a defiant look at the by-standers. That wallet was George's ultimo ratio, and when pushed in an argument, or at loss for a reply, he would flourish it at his opponent, with an offer to wager any sum on the moot-point; a rebutter which, if it did not carry conviction, enabled George to close the issue in a triumphant manner. There was a story current to the effect that he had once startled a tableful of Methodist clergymen, assembled to take tea at Mrs. Gildersleeve's during a conference, by proffering to the decorous men a bet on the correct interpretation of a disputed passage in St. John; but this lacked confirmation, for George, if he had but little respect for any one else, had a great deal for his wife, and as such an act would have shocked her exceedingly, it is not at all likely that it took place.

The sagacious reader has doubtless come to the conclusion that the Gildersleeve family was composed of rather incongruous members, and yet, for one comprising such opposite characters, its harmony was remarkable. They occupied a small two-story dwelling with a flower-garden attached, in a side street, not far from the Archimedes Works. A large, bright brass door-plate bore in very loud letters the name: GILDERSLEEVE—as if there were none other of that name in the universe, or as if this was the Gildersleeve par excellence of all who were fortunate enough to bear that honest patronymic. Aside from this, the residence presented a very quiet and modest appearance. The interior was plainly furnished, but neat as wax. In the little parlor were old-fashioned mahogany chairs and sofas dark with age, but polished, and protected with snowy tidies. In one corner was Mark's piano, and on either side of the chimney-breast hung portraits in oil of Mr. and Mrs. Gildersleeve, taken when they were first married, and looking wooden in port and flat as to perspective, faced on the opposite side by photographic likenesses of the same at a mature age. Then between the windows was a colored photograph of Mr. Gildersleeve in his costume of foreman of a fire company, with red shirt, leathern cap, and trumpet; and still another representing him in his regalia as a Sir Knight of the Sancho Panza Commandery of the Knights of the Golden Fleece. George had a passion for counterfeit presentments of himself, and in the album on the centre-table might have been found a number of others, taken in various attitudes and in various expressions of obstinacy, by that distinguished artist, Alonzo Snopple, Esq., who kept duplicates in his "studio" and never failed to call visitors' attention to them as remarkable pictures of a remarkable self-made man. "Fine head," he would say, "very fine head—rare combination of intellect and force—especially force. Strongly marked lineaments, well adapted for Rembrandt effects. Observe the lights and shadows, that well-defined nose, etc.;" and George seemingly was not indisposed to allow the public every opportunity to familiarize itself with the representation of such a masterpiece of nature in the way of a head. Besides his love of portraiture, he was given to keeping fast trotters and game-cocks, and in the stables at the Works were stalls devoted to a span of the speediest Morgans for the owner's private use, and in the stable yard strutted a certain breed of "orange-piles," whose pugnacious qualities were almost as well known as those of the celebrated fowls of the Derby walk; the dauntless game-cocks, that: